This just in:  So, big surprise, there was another shooting at another school, this time in Texas.

Three things happened immediately: (1) Thoughts and prayer were sent out by the politicians, (2) Promises from everyone to fix the problem and (3) Announcing fixes that have nothing to do with gun control.

Ted Cruz even made the title quote above.  He has absolutely no plan to fix anything but this make it look like for the first time…He’s going to get to the bottom of this.  Right?

Let’s start with this: Texas is a “gun state.”  They like their guns and I think they should have all the guns they want.  They don’t need my permission.  The NRA, last year, gave $73,000 to Republican politicians in the state, all of whom got NRA grades of A or A+.  They did give $3,000 to Democrats but nearly all Texas Democrats got a grade of F.

Now, if I was running for political office, I would tattoo the “F” on my forehead.  I would want everyone to know that I think the NRA is a Russian sponsored terrorist organization that only wants your money and the money they get from selling guns (actually, promoting gun ownership so their sponsors can sell guns.)

Texas Lt. Governor was on the news laying out his plan which includes (1) faster background checks  (2) better mental health screening and (3) arm teachers.   So, if we know people have a history of gun violence, we can keep them from getting guns.  A couple of notes on this…it currently takes about 3 minutes to run a background check.  I’m not sure the ability to do this in 2 minutes will make much of a difference.

The “mental health” issue seems to imply that we have more mental health problems that drive people to mass killings than every other industrialized nation.  I find this logic astoundingly flawed.  The only thing more amazing that an educated person would say this is that other educated people believe it.

There is also the argument that laws to control guns will not be followed by people that don’t want to follow them.  What follows from this logic is “Therefore, we should not make gun laws.”  What is interesting to me is that this “Let’s not make laws because they don’t work” is the main argument for no gun control by lawmakers.

That’s right, if the NRA pays you enough money, you, a lawmaker, will stand up and tell people that laws don’t work.

On a completely unrelated note…

Did you know that kids in the United States between the ages of 15 and 18 are 82 times more likely to die from gun violence that kids of the same age in the other industrialized nations?

Here is the bottom line:  Our guns are out of control.  We don’t need to take away everyone’s guns to fix this.  If you are a Republican that takes money from the NRA, you are guilty of murder about 36,000 times a year.  If you vote for Republicans that support the NRA you are just as guilty.

Take a look at the gun control link in my toolbar at the top of this page.  I made up that list with no experience and no deep thought….in about 5 minutes.  Maybe none of those ideas are good.  But it does tell me that there are options besides relying on “Thoughts and Prayers.”

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim